A Post of Deja Vus

I have certainly been preoccupied this past month, but every time I decide to post something, I always think to myself, “Didn’t I already write that?”  Although October has been a busy month, most of the exciting events that took place over the past few weeks are not in any way momentous.  In fact, many events are repeats of things I did last year.  However, I am providing a quick synopsis of the major events below.

Macedonian Open Seminar for Education and Motivation

MOSEM 2014

Also know as MOSEM, this seminar is hosted by AIESEC Macedonia every autumn to prepare all of the members (but especially the new) for the year’s work ahead.  It was hosted on October 9-12 in a Yugoslav-style hotel/ resort in Ohrid.  This was the first time that I had attended one of these conferences as a part of the Executive Board, so it was great to discuss strategies for our LCs while the other members learned the basics of AIESEC.

This conference was so monumental since all of the executive boards across Macedonia were able to bond over this weekend.  We also developed some plans for our educations and Functional Area processes, which will help us kickstart our work for the next year.  Since I am managing both the Outgoing Exchange and Human Resources processes for our local committee this year, it was nice to have subsequent sets of meetings to focus on these topics and clarify the processes that were confusing to me.

Divulging about the sessions would certainly bore most readers, but I did receive a pleasant surprise during the end of the seminar.   On the last night of the conference, the organizing team nominated the “most active” members of each track.  They nominated me for the “most active” member of the EB track.  Even though I was flattered to receive this recognition, I also worried that maybe I participated too much and should have let the other EB members contribute more during the conference.  In other words, I was neglecting my “sustainability” pledge as a PCV.  Nevertheless, I received as a part of the nomination a “Tip of the Day” book that is written in Macedonian, which should simultaneously motivate me and improve my Macedonian as I read through it.

 

Sunset by the resort

Field Day 2014

On October 18, all of the Macedonian Peace Corps volunteers gathered at the City Park in Skopje to celebrate Field Day.  Just like last year, this is the first time we all are able to meet each other.  The MAK 18s were in charge of organizing this event, and I spent most of the morning sautéing some spicy pork with soy sauce and vegetables.  My dish was definitely a hit among the new volunteers, as 2 kilograms of meat were devoured way before any of the non-trainees were able to reach the dish.

At field day, I met my other site mates for the first time.  Two are currently training in Lozovo, and one hails from Alabama, so we quickly found some common ground.  The rest of the night was spent traversing around our most visited pubs in Skopje (namely the Irish Pub and Pivnica).  Exhaustion from my endless pile of work cut the night short, as it has throughout most of these past months.

YMLP and GLOW Reuinion

The day after Field Day, a reunion was hosted at the NOVA High School in Skopje for alumni of the YMLP and GLOW camps.  The coordinators for both programs organized and/or managed this event.  This event was overwhelmingly attended by the GLOW alumni, but it was nice to see a few of the YMLP guys from the past camp.  The highlight for me was learning how to swing dance with the Director of the Peace Corps in Macedonia.  She is the epitome of professionalism and epic-ness in PC Macedonia, so I was definitely flattered that she chose me as her dance partner, even if just for a few minutes.

Community Development Panel

As if I already did not have enough on my plate and enough to fuel my ego, I was invited by Peace Corps to present on a panel for the Community Development Trainees during their Hub Day in Skopje last Friday.  As participants of the panel, we were expected to share our workplace culture and experience with Project Design and Management.  The other panelists that joined me were Spencer, who has experience working in a municipality, and Christy, who works with an NGO that focuses on the needs of its Roma community.

As we described our organizations and workplace culture, we highlighted many of the points that we learned last year before entering our organization.  The major theme was the universal informality of the workplace in Macedonia, whether we work with youths, government officials, or underrepresented groups.   We also agreed out loud about the pace of Peace Corps work- the first year is dull, as the learning/ integration curve is steep, but the second year quickly becomes fast-paced and busy.

A few of the new volunteers will take the place of an older volunteer at an organization or municipality, which may be good in some cases (the organization is accustomed to working with an American volunteer) and worrying in others (the new replacement may be expected to have the same skills, interests, and work style as the previous volunteer).  Based on the questions and responses of the new trainees during the panel, they all seem excited yet confused about their involvement in their organizations, so I hope that we were able to explain to them well that it may take them a while before they feel completely comfortable within their new organization- in other words feel like they are contributing to their full capacity.  

Sveta Petka in Lozovo

This past weekend, I returned to my training site to visit my old host family and to celebrate the town slava. This was my first time returning since March, and I happily anticipated hanging out with my old host family again.  This year, October is definitely much colder than the last, so it was a bit strange to be in Lozovo while the temperatures were so low.  Unfortunately, I started to develop a cold as soon as I embarked on my bus, and my health only deteriorated throughout my stay.

My old host family prepared for me a slew of delicious meals throughout the weekend.  I enjoyed Jagoda’s classic chicken with rice on the first night, and she made pork with leeks on the second.  I also had the opportunity to run the old trail to Milino, drink some beers with the trainees at the motel, spend some na gostis at a few of the other host families, and take a walk through the serene atmosphere of Lozovo.

Sunday night, the whole town prepared to celebrate the Slava.  I joined Blagoj and Emilija at their place for their Slava at home, where I continued to binge on some good ol’ country food.  After spending a couple of hours by them, my new host sister Allison (a MAK19) and I joined the others near the church to dance the oro.  Despite being so busy and contracting a cold, I do not regret taking time out of the weekend to experience this opportunity again.  The Slava in Lozovo is the most traditional event in which I have been able to participate during my time in Macedonia, and it is great to see so many familiar souls enlivened and gathered for this festive event.

Celebrating the Slava in Lozovo with new and old faces

Sick Again
So the bad news is that I caught another cold on Saturday on my way to the Slava.  But the good news is that this is the first cold I have contracted in about 5 months.  Luckily I was able to stock up on some cough drops while in Skopje for the Hub Day (and for my flu shot).  Also, a BIG thanks to all of those back home who shipped to me NyQuil.  This has been one of the shortest colds I have ever had (Saturday until today, if my white blood cells and antibodies achieve unconditional surrender by tomorrow morning).  Overall, this was a great warm-up for my immune system for what I predict (based on current trends) will be a cold winter in the Balkans.

A Little Comedic Relief... Maybe

One of my favorite shows is Key & Peele- two comedians of mixed race who intelligently poke fun at a lot of the social "norms" across America.  And they do a great Obama impression.

But this week, they released a skit on their show that has hit closer to home (er..?) than many of their other skits.  They made a joke about Macedonians and Albanians.

I am providing the Youtube link for the skit below (if this infringes on the copyright laws and I must remove it, please kindly comment below).  In short, the restaurant pokes fun at an American couple dining at a Macedonian restaurant, and the owners of the restaurant are outraged that the couple would compare the Macedonian "kepapi" to the Albanian "qebapi" (though in Prilep, we say "chebabi").

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3ZHebCyMbM#t=53

At first this clip is offensive, basically because no Macedonian (let alone an owner of a kafana) acts this way.  This is just Kegan Key's over-the-top way of acting, and usually it is funny.  Therefore, I am not completely offended by the way this skit is performed, even though Macedonian shop owners don't create havoc in their kitchens or stab a map with a knife.

However, deep down the skit discusses some truths, and I find it commendable that Key and Peele are aware of these.  It is no secret that Macedonians and Albanians (at least on a political level) are in conflict.  As I mentioned before, many Macedonians mentioned to me that they do not mind "Albanians from Albania," but Albanians from Kosovo or Macedonia are in their opinion less reputable.  Yet, as I mentioned in one of my first posts, it is often difficult for me to tell the difference between the two ethnicities (Macedonians and Albanians) while walking down the street.

Of course, there are many differences in their culture, and religion plays a big part of it.  But food, style of music, clothing, etc. is very similar across the Balkans.  The menus in Macedonia are often similar to the menus in Albania, Bulgaria, Bosnia, etc.  I cannot count the number of times that Macedonians covet some of their traditions or cultural icons as unique to their culture.  For example, I once asked a host family member where ajvar originated, hoping to learn the correct facts, but secretly knowing that, of course, it must be Macedonia.  Not only that, but supposedly ajvar is not produced in other countries in the Balkans, including Serbia or Bulgaria.

Likewise, when I told an HCN friend that I went to a club in Albania and heard Albanian turbo folk for the first time, he reacted in disgust and asked if it was horrible.  Honestly, it was, but so is Serbian turbo folk.  To foreigners, turbo folk is turbo folk, just as American hip hop probably sounds similar to French hip hop, especially to those who speak neither English nor French.

The point of this post is not to say that Macedonians, Albanians, or any other ethnicity from the Balkans do not have unique traditions or holidays to be proud of.  Even though many of the Balkan countries have traditions that stem from the Ottomans, their are also many unique traditions that originated in each country.  For example, Ilenden and Revolution Day (Anti-Fascism Day) are really cool holidays in Macedonia, and there are plenty of traditional Macedonian songs that are great to listen to or sing while eating or drinking.

What I am trying to say by referencing this video is that many Balkan countries have more in common than they have dividing them.  Yet they continue to fight over nationalistic nonsense.  For example, during the qualifying match for the Europa League earlier this week, an Albanian flag was flown by a drone over the match, resulting in a fight among the players and a riot within the crowd (see link below for an article).  The man who executed this stunt is obviously a moron, but the players and fans could have exercised a little more self control.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2792953/serbia-vs-albania-suspended-martin-atkinson-banned-fans-use-drone-fly-flag-pitch-leading-violet-scenes-belgrade.html

Maybe geo-politics explains so much of this sense of division (so many mountains dividing peoples). Maybe the way the Ottomans ruled for half a millennium better explains it.  Either way, as an American I see the similarities among them more than I see the differences.  And happily for these ethnicities, each has their own nation to claim (except for the Roma).  Thus, instead of trying to mentally divide themselves as nationalities and create "pure" nations dedicated to a certain ethnicity (similar to fascism in the early 1900s), it would be nice for each nationality to recognize the similarities and create more porous borders and substantial relationships across ethnicities.  The European Union already shows that nations can identify as European while continuing to value what makes them unique as an ethnicity.  Peoples in the Balkans may need to see themselves as "Southeast European" before they can get that far.

Key and Peele are able to poke fun at both black and white groups in the United States because they are both half-black, half-white.  By no means did they win any right to address either group simply by being mixed race, but they certainly have a competitive advantage of understanding and projecting both races versus other "less-mixed" comedians.  Likewise, since (I assume) neither comedian is Albanian or Macedonia, neither has a right to poke fun at their lifestyles.  However, they have certainly lent some of their understanding to explaining the issue between the two ethnicities.  Just as they try to explain that dividing African-Americans and white-Americans simply divides Americans, they seem to do the same with these Balkan groups.  Did they succeed?  I am not sure, but I laughed a bit.

Member Recruitment

September flew by.  The sparseness of my past posts probably insinuated how busy I have been over the past month.  Ideally I would have posted about my brother’s and my vacation in a more condensed group of posts, but posting about these experiences stretched over three weeks was a result of the limited time I had to keep up with my blog.

There are a few reasons why I had been so busy over the past month, but most of it can be attributed to the work I was dedicating to my organization.  As I previously mentioned, from August 15 to September 30, my local committee was hosting six interns to execute two different projects- one which taught Italian and German to the youth in our community, and the other which hosted environmental seminars and activities in the area.  I took a large role in managing the environmental project, and I thought that after the photo campaign, where our interns toured Prilep and Bitola to market the project and our local committee, I would have more free time to focus on other duties while the interns taught the environmental classes.  However, one of the interns majorly starting slacking, and I often had to step in to ensure that the project was not a failure.

Yet, I needed as much breathing room as I could attain because by the middle of September, my organization would begin to implement the activity that is most important to our committee’s survival and success- member recruitment.  Throughout the summer, AIESEC Prilep was run by four people- our executive board.  All of the projects that we were designing and implementing relied on our energy and time in order to execute every detail, all the way down to minutia.  Thus it was imperative that we recruit a large number of quality members for our upcoming year, so we spent a whole week and a half marketing our organization, traveling to Bitola, and holding our breaths that our tireless efforts to showcase “how beneficial AIESEC is as an organization” would result in the recruitment of the best members.

On the first day of recruitment, we hosted a Global Village, where we converted one of the classrooms into an AIESEC information center.  Accompanied by blasting music and odors of ethnic cuisines, various tables displayed the benefits and components of AIESEC while our AIESEC interns from Poland, Italy, Germany, Lithuania, and Turkey flouted their international diversity.  Even though the event was well organized, oddly it was difficult to convince many of the students at the Economics faculty to enter the room and learn about AIESEC.  We gained some success in attracting applications, but the number was far below what we had hoped, and throughout the rest of the week applications materialized at a trickling rate. 

Set up for our Global Village

Our AIESEC interns

Simultaneously, a secondary project that I am coordinating (along with my site mate, Husted) for this year (CLIPS, or Civic Leadership in Prilep Scholars) was also hosting its recruitment for new members.  Even though I had assisted or managed a few seminars last year for CLIPS, I was new to the overall organization structure of the program, but aware that the group needed to recruit a diversity of talented students.  Seeing that the group still lacked a good number of applicants, especially from Prilep’s Economic high school, I arranged with two of the project assistants impromptu information sessions at two of the high schools in town.  These efforts achieved huge success, as applications from the Economics high school increased nearly 4-fold, and overall we received a hefty number of applicants for CLIPS.

As for AIESEC’s recruitment, we were disheartened as applications continued to remain stubbornly low, and few applicants attended our Info Day to better explain the vision and purpose of AIESEC.  We were well short of our goal of recruiting 28 new members, but fate finally decided to smile on us as AIESEC Prilep received an additional six applications as the deadline for applications closed.   

While the most tentative part of the member recruitments passed, the most time-intensive part was about to begin.  For a whole week, I became busy with interviewing applicants for both CLIPS and AIESEC.  Each interview was scheduled for about thirty minutes, which means that I dedicated 22 hours of interviews over the course of 5 days.  Of course, with my other office duties, managing the environmental project with the interns, and spending some time with my host family, my day was packed.  One of my busiest days included interviewing both AIESEC and CLIPS applicants in the morning at the economics faculty, coming home to eat and help my host family roast peppers for ajvar, returning to the faculty to interview CLIPS members, returning home to roast more peppers, conducting an interview with an AIESEC applicant from Bitola by Skype, and then heading to the center to overcome a crisis with our interns’ trash fashion show.  I never thought Peace Corps would involve 12+ hour workdays!

Roasting peppers for ajvar

Domestic work with the host family

AIESEC Info Day

Looking back on those weeks, I am amazed at all that my counterparts and I were able to achieve.  We invested a lot of sweat, hope, and time into the member recruitment, and with the educational plans, tracking and evaluations, and reward and recognition program that we designed over the following week, we can say that we succeeded in building the HR process for our organization.  Never did I imagine that I would have the opportunity to design and implement a complete HR functionality within an organization before coming to Peace Corps, especially while simultaneously coordinating a handful of other projects.  Thus I look back on these weeks with pride.

September felt like a prolonged sprint, and now that I can catch my breath, I cannot believe that it is no longer summer.  The vegetables are bland, running on the trails everyday in mild weather is no longer an option, and in about a week we will meet the new PC volunteers at Field Day in Skopje. 

In a way, this Peace Corps experience feels like climbing a mountain.  At first I had no idea how to get to the top, and many of my days were spent surveying the best options.  But as I begin to climb at higher elevations, the gradient is steeper, and sometimes giving up or taking it easy means that I will simply fall off the face.  I do not think there is any Peace Corps volunteer who knows exactly how to achieve whatever the ideal situation may be during their experience.  Instead, we just become better climbers, and the challenge of climbing steeper, higher, or scarier terrain becomes more tantalizing than descending or maintaining elevation.  But once we reach a new high and stop to take a breath, the views can be astonishing.